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“There are a number of women who are called Durga or Parvathy or Lakshmi. So why are we making a fuss over a film being named after a goddess? Especially when there is nothing in it that maligns the goddess. Why don’t they watch the film before criticising it?”
"How can we say we’re living in a democracy when it is based on political hypocrisy?” asks Sanal Kumar Sasidharan, director of the controversial film S Durga. “When the government takes such an aggressive stance against something it doesn’t like, it means we have no hope,” he says. “It is doubtful how long we can remain as a nation.” He was speaking about his film, but he might as well have been pointing out everything that’s wrong with our society—fundamentalism, hypocrisy and intolerance.
Initially called Sexy Durga, the film’s name was changed to S Durga to get clearance from the censor board. It is about a girl called Durga who, while eloping with her lover Kabeer, becomes a victim of the patriarchy subtly embedded within Kerala society. The controversy erupted when the ministry of information and broadcasting dropped the film, along with another one called Nude, from being screened in the Panorama section of the ongoing film festival in Goa on the ground that they hurt public sentiment. In protest, three of the 13 members of the jury, including chairman Sujoy Ghosh, resigned.
Later, the Kerala High Court overruled the I&B ministry’s decision, stating that there was no reason that the censor-board approved version of the film should not be screened. However, two days after the High Court order, IFFI is yet to clear the screening schedule. The movie's lead actress Rajshri Deshpande told IANS on the sidelines of the International Film Festival of India (IFFI) that it was frustrating to be at the gala and not be able to watch the movie despite a clear judicial direction."Unfortunately, we are discussing about the controversy and waiting for the film to be screened here. It is so frustrating," Deshpande said.
“It is not just the sexuality in the title of the film that the government had a problem with,” says Sasidharan. “After all, it was the ruling party itself which made sure that the alleged sex video of [Patidar leader] Hardik Patel was aired on television. The whole issue is not about objecting to sexuality but propagating a particular political agenda.” Why should they act as custodians of the nation’s morality, he asks. “We are not children or fools for the government to try to control us like a parent.
There is a dark and brooding quality to Sasidharan’s films, evidence perhaps of the influence of his role models Adoor Gopalakrishnan and G. Aravindan. For somebody who could not live up to his father’s dream of making him a doctor, Sasidharan has come a long way. His short film Frog won three state awards at the Kerala State Television Awards. His first feature film Oraalppokkam won awards like the NETPAC and FIPRESCI at International Film Festival of Kerala (IFFK). Sexy Durga won the Hivos Tiger Award at the International Film Festival of Rotterdam.
What irks Sasidharan is the ignorance of those who object to his film. “There are a number of women who are called Durga or Parvathy or Lakshmi. So why are we making a fuss over a film being named after a goddess? Especially when there is nothing in it that maligns the goddess. Why don’t they watch the film before criticising it?” he asks. He refers to works like Soundarya Lahari by Shankaracharya and Lalitha Sahasranamam, from Brahmanda Purana. “Various body parts of goddesses are described in detail in these works,” he says.
I question him about something he posted on Facebook: “The more you are alone, the more you are fearless. It is not courage. It is just freedom from concerns.” He says that he was not just talking about himself but about artists in general. “All artists should be fearless because they are telling the truth in a society that is steeped in false hypocrisy. It will go to all lengths to make you an enemy.”
“You only encounter naysayers when you try to fight injustice; people who don’t believe that they can make a difference in the world, he says. “Those who try to fight the system become clowns,” he says. “You really feel helpless in this situation.”
It’s not just that he’s a victim of “false hypocrisy” but he was also an observer of it. In fact, that’s how he got the idea for S Durga. After the horrendous gangrape of 23-year-old paramedic Nirbhaya in Delhi, he began thinking of how we claim to worship women as goddesses and yet perpetrate such gross atrocities against them. “We say morality should prevail in religion and it should not allow violence against women,” he says. “Yet, it does.”
One of the tasks of a good filmmaker is to open our eyes to the truth. It is sad that when someone has attempted to do so, he got recognition in Rotterdam instead of his own country.
